Any reasonable person who examines this affair knows what was behind this; simply an attempt by Rather and Mapes to influence an election. Another symptom of the rot that has infested the news business and about 52.6% of the population of this country. They failed, but unfortunately for this republic the entire MSM and entertainment complex was able to succeed last election, and this country will pay dearly for that "success."
I have fond memories of GHW Bush cleaning Rather's clock when Rather tried to pull a "gotcha" on him during an interview when he was VP, and I suspect part of Rather's motivation was payback to the Bush family for that humiliation.
